Preprocess to JSON

#!/usr/bin/env ruby

require 'json'

r = ''
for line in DATA
  line.gsub!(/^(\s*"[^=]+":\s*")(.*?)(",\s*)$/) {
    b, m, a = $~.captures
    "#{b}#{m.gsub('"', '\\"')}#{a}"
  }
  puts line
  r << line
end

p JSON.parse(r)

__END__
{
  "key1": "foo"bar"baz",
  "key2": "foo",
  "key3": "foo"bar"",
  "key4": "bar"
}

thanks @flori

gsub is unable escape quotes when the JSON data is in minified state.
{"key1": "foo"bar"baz","key2": "foo","key3": "foo"bar"","key4": "bar"}

I wish it worked with minified JSON !

PS : Those lists i need to process are in minified state

Hi @flori, To make things more complex. This is the list I'm trying to parse.

Pretty JSON

{
    "results": [
        {
            "id": "1",
            "name": "f"o"o",
            "distance": "",
            "address": "b"a"r",
            "AlsoListedIn": {
                "arr_len": "5",
                "also_content": [
                    {
                        "cat_id": "",
                        "category": "foo",
                        "category_display": "bar"
                    },
                    {
                        "cat_id": "302",
                        "category": "foo",
                        "category_display": "bar",
                        "movietime": ""
                    }
                ]
            },
            "ratings": {
                "total": "0",
                "ratings": []
            },
            "city": "xyz"
        },
        {
            "id": "2",
            "name": "f"o"o",
            "distance": "",
            "address": "b"a"r",
            "AlsoListedIn": {
                "arr_len": "5",
                "also_content": [
                    {
                        "cat_id": "",
                        "category": "foo",
                        "category_display": "bar"
                    },
                    {
                        "cat_id": "302",
                        "category": "foo",
                        "category_display": "bar",
                        "movietime": ""
                    }
                ]
            },
            "ratings": {
                "total": "0",
                "ratings": []
            },
            "city": "xyz"
        }
    ]
}

Tidy JSON

{"results":[{"id":"1","name":"f"o"o","distance":"","address":"b"a"r","AlsoListedIn":{"arr_len":"5","also_content":[{"cat_id":"","category":"foo","category_display":"bar"},{"cat_id":"302","category":"foo","category_display":"bar","movietime":""}]},"ratings":{"total":"0","ratings":[]},"city":"xyz"},{"id":"2","name":"f"o"o","distance":"","address":"b"a"r","AlsoListedIn":{"arr_len":"5","also_content":[{"cat_id":"","category":"foo","category_display":"bar"},{"cat_id":"302","category":"foo","category_display":"bar","movietime":""}]},"ratings":{"total":"0","ratings":[]},"city":"xyz"}]}

I'll be so thankful to you if you could help out !

@flori I'm unable to PREPROCESS the Tidy JSON. I request you to help me out.